


strangely, you feel like home.

by akiaes (orphan_account)



Category: GOT7
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff and Angst, High School AU, M/M, canon AU, multiple AUs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-13
Updated: 2018-01-13
Packaged: 2019-03-04 10:54:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13363158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/akiaes
Summary: they fall in love, always. but never enough, and never at the right time. (alt description: in which mark and jackson fall apart through multiple aus, and fall back together in their canon one.)





	strangely, you feel like home.

i. 

they meet in high school. jackson, of course, is the all smiles, loud mouthed brat that everyone adores. the one who drops off a coffee at your desk when you’re tired or helps you study even if he doesn’t take the class. he knows everyone in the small town and takes full advantage of it--holding big parties for people’s birthdays and being sure to invite _everyone_.

mark, on the other hand, likes to stays more in the shadow. quiet, but always cheering jackson on. he attends every single match jackson plays on when he finally makes the team in the tenth grade. mark's always been a big fan of basketball, and to watch someone play with such passion made his heart swell with joy.

“wow,” jackson mumbles to himself, when his dad, er, coach wang finally introduces them. mark makes a big impression on him.

it would have been hard not to, considering the big wheelchair for such a small boy with two missing legs.

his smile though, makes an even bigger impression. eyes slightly shut and teeth shining, jackson tries not to notice the cute way his nose crinkles up in the most heartfelt and heartwarming way ever. (he fails drastically, unable to keep himself from smiling back.)

“i’m mark, mark tuan. nice to meet you.”

“jackson, jackson wang.” they shake hands, and it sends shivers up jackson’s spine. warm, sweaty palms slide against the other’s cold, dry ones. “ah, sorry. i’m a bit gross right now after the game.”

“nah, it's alright.” mark motions for him to sit on the bench beside him, and jackson silently nods. “you know, i have a brother named joey. he’s only a little younger than me, and you too i think. he loves to play basketball and i swear to god, i love him so much but he sucks _ass--” “_ mark, language!” “sorry coach! but seriously, you seem so skilled for your age. what's your secret? when did you start playing?”

jackson’s mouth hinges open. a total cutie and a basketball fan? what a score. “um, i started when i was about 5. i wanted to start earlier but my dad would never let me play with the older kids. there was a boy who played ball on my block and i was so envious of him. i guess he was my inspiration, even if he was a bit of a bully.”

“aww, cute.” mark gushes. “did you ever see him again?”

“yeah, haha. he's kind of the varsity basketball team captain. our town’s a small one.”

“oh my god--im jaebum was your childhood bully?"

jackson flushes in surprise. “woah, you know him? i mean, well yeah people change but, how do you know him? you're new here, aren't you?”

mark giggles. “i don't know _him_ ,” he leans in, cupping his hand over jackson’s ear even though coach wang had already wandered off ages ago, “i know his _boyfriend_ , park jinyoung. we go to camp together. he's kind of my summer-time-only best friend.”

he chokes back his laughter. “ _the_ park jinyoung? that dude's a monster you know. you're better off sticking with me as your all-the-time best friend.”

“aw, jinyoungie’s not that bad,” mark tries to frown but can’t help himself from laughing along. “-at least not when you get to know him! but i might take you up on that offer. i’m in the 11th grade already with no friends. the basketball team’s star player jackson wang might be a good start.”

“wow, don't flatter me.” jackson bats his eyelashes and gives off his best celebrity pose earning a squeal from mark. “why do you like basketball anyway? your legs are kind of--wait that's really mean of me to say right? fuck, i’m sorry--”

“gone? no, no. it's alright.” he gives back a soft, toothy smile. “i lost both of them to cancer. it's fine though, i guess. i’d rather have no legs than be stuck in a hospital bed till the day i die. besides, since I lost them so young, life doesn't seem _that_ much harder, y'know?”

“i don't know. sorry.” he’s quieter now, careful, but mark won’t have any of it.

“aw, don’t be like that. it's okay. i just wish.. i just wish i could play basketball! you seem so cool running around and shooting through hoops and the teamwork and tension is so, i don't know, rad, i guess. i’d love to be a basketball player like you.”

jackson stares back at him confused. “well, who says you can't be?” 

“what do you mean?”

“you could still shoot from below.”

“so? i can't move as fast as everyone else.”

“oh boo. that's just an inconvenience. here, i’ll help you.”

“but- woah, woah. jackson, what are you doing… jackson-!” mark squeals when jackson grabs a hold of his handles and spins his chair around. he grasps onto his armrests for dear life as they wheel onto the court and near the basketball cart. 

jackson runs around, grabbing a few balls and tosses them at mark from a distance. “here! try to shoot!”

mark furrows his eyebrows. he looks back at jackson who looks way too eager about this, and takes a deep breath. “what. you can’t be serious.”

“i am! now shoot!”

he frowns but tries anyway. “ugh, fine.” tossing the ball around between his hands first, mark concentrates and lifts his arms into the air. ready, steady, aim, and... _shoot!_

he misses, much to his dismay, and whines about it. “aw, jackson i didn't make it, see-! dude, what the fuck.” his face falls a couple of millimeters short of a rubber ball in the face. 

“continue shooting, _dude_!”

“oh my god, _okay mom_.” mark grumbles.

he misses again, and again, and again.

“here,” jackson plants himself behind mark. “lift your arms like this but make sure to bend them at a larger angle since you're shooting from below. you want the ball to go up and forward, not either or. it's not a slow motion thing. during the game, you have to make quick decisions. avoid hitting the board, there's a very small chance it will bounce back into the hoop.”

“wow, so smart.” mark teases. he fails to make the next shot though, and sighs. “i suck. at this rate i’ll never be as good as you.”

“aw cheer up. i’ll just have to teach you.”

 

and he does.

throughout the year, the duo meet up after school every day to shoot hoops and play dumb games. they catch the attention of jaebum and jinyoung sometimes, and have small basketball matches in which no one keeps count. jackson finds himself loving the high-pitched laugh that erupts from mark every time they race across the court, cutting jaebum off from being passed the ball. jackson finds himself loving mark along the way too.

they go over to each other’s houses sometimes. jackson is adored by mark’s sisters, with hair just long enough to put into dumb ponytails, and genuine interest in critiquing their outfits before dates. joey loves him too, maybe more of an admiration than love if we're being honest, and begs him to give him his old basketball uniform when he graduates.

(“ugh, what would you need an old sweaty uniform for, joey? i’ll just buy you a new one,” their father yells out.

“you'd never understand, dad! it’s like an honor system! a good luck charm!”)

mark always kisses his cheeks on dares and giggles, wheeling away. it's so obvious the tuan siblings (excluding jackson’s biggest crush ever) have it out to get the two of them together. “you guys would be so cute!” grace whispers to him, and jackson’s glad because he thinks so too.

back at home, jackson’s parents dote on mark so much, they've gotten close to officially adopting him as their own son. and while jackson’s a little jealous when mark gets passed the dumplings at the dinner table first, he can’t find himself getting mad. there's nothing more than this setting that he'd want in the world. (he gets revenge by making fun of mark’s broken mandarin sometimes, only to get a fistful of popcorn in the face.)

at night, after jackson’s helped mark into bed and snuggled up beside him, he dreams.

he dreams of a world where he admits his love and it's reciprocated tenfold, just in time for the senior dance. after high school, they'd go on coffee dates in between seminars. who cares if they don't share the same campus? they can rent out an apartment in the middle and give each other goodbye kisses before coming back at night and ordering take out. they’d work on their majors and have a big vacation at the end of every year to spain, france, hong kong, south korea, and thailand. maybe a year abroad would do them well. (they could even meet jackson’s pen pals! he should start preparing youngjae, yugyeom, and bambam now.) maybe sometime, far off into the future, they could get married and adopt two kids or two dogs, whichever mark prefers more. though, to be honest, he knows mark would agree to both.

but it turns out there’s just one problem with his plans.

  
  


mark’s not gay.

jackson finds this out a week before senior prom in which mark asked out a cute junior who’s actually taking spanish with him. her name is naeyeon and she's pale, skinny, and beautiful. everything jackson is not. really, it shouldn't hurt as much as it does. mark is _his_ best friend, everyone thinks _they're_ dating, and just because he's not _gay_ doesn’t mean he’s _straight_ either.  

his heart slowly breaks however, when tammy sends him a basket of chocolate and tissues with joey, who came over to play a game of ball. “sorry dude. we all thought he liked you. like, a lot.”

“whatever; it's fine.”

jackson's plans do come sorts true though. mark dumps naeyeon a week later after finding out she had only pitied him. he goes back to hanging out with jackson and crying into his shoulder on occasion because really, would no one love an amputee like him? all jackson wants to do is kiss him quiet and say he doesn’t care that mark can’t walk, he'd gladly spend the rest of his life with him if it meant seeing that cute smile and holding his pretty hands for hours and hours just because he wants to. but instead he whispers of course someone will love him, what is there not to love?

 

-

 

they grow apart after high school, when they don’t end up in the same college and jackson finds himself struggling to juggle his sport scholarship with his academics. he doesn’t have the time to stress about his feelings when his grades become much more important. he stops noticing that mark doesn’t reply to his texts and stops hearing his stupidly high-pitched voice in his dreams. stops crying about an unreciprocated love because there stops being a love to reciprocate back.

 

-

 

jackson graduates with a masters in energy engineering which became more important to him than basketball ever was. he awards himself with a flight to thailand where he meets bambam for the first time ever and cries at how much he’s grown from the fourteen year old baby faced dancer he met on myspace to a twenty year old running his own family cafe. bambam offers him a hug and a table at the store where he asks his sister to cover his shift so they could catch up.

bambam’s stories are nice and jackson likes the way their hands slip together when they walk. he enjoys spending time at the cafe and starts becoming more of a part-time employee rather than a regular customer. he decides to snag a job at the local electrical company and sleeps in bambam’s house where they share a tiny room and a tiny bed.

jackson likes bambam’s long eyelashes and how he looks younger when he sleeps. he loves that bambam doesn’t lead him on and is the first to kiss him when they try out a new cake recipe they had found online. he thinks he loves bambam and is glad because bambam says he loves him too.

 

-

 

jackson doesn’t even hear back from mark until later, five years later, when his parents send him a copy of his will and a box of the memories they once had.

it turns out he had moved back to taiwan to die at home, because the cancer in his legs hadn’t stopped spreading and he’d always wanted to be outside more than stuck in a hospital bed. his will contains a letter to jackson that reads:

 

“hey. i’m sorry.

i’m sorry for never acknowledging your feelings and i’m sorry i never could love you back. i knew but just kept doing nothing about it and i’m so, fucking sorry.

i’m sorry i stopped replying to you, i never wanted to but. you were my best friend who didn’t care i was an amputee and you were my inspiration and my ride or die. i’m sorry i’m straight and i’m sorry i didn’t ask you out to senior prom and i’m sorry tammy had to tell me this before i figured it out myself.

your parents helped me up to your room one day where they said that i could wait for you to come home there but you already were home and through your door i could hear you crying and god what the fuck. i did that?

but this shouldn’t be about me and i hope you’re okay now. that the distance has made you stronger and that you’ve moved onto to someone who can love you. it’s been eleven years since i first met you and i hope you will have forgotten about me since then. i hope this can be a fresh start between us.

jinyoung told me you’ve met up with your old penpal bambam. you should tell me about him if i ever get out of the hospital.

thank you for loving me when i thought nobody else did.

\- mark tuan”

 

scribbled at the bottom in joey’s handwriting is the date of the letter and the date of his death. mark died seven days after the note was written.

jackson throws out the letter after reading it, and tries to forget about it. his wedding is soon and he doesn’t need this toll on his heart.

 

**Author's Note:**

> hey ! this is my first fic on here aa. constructive criticism is appreciated.
> 
> leave me a message on:  
> twt: kimstuan  
> cc: akiaes  
> ig: haesaya
> 
> this is actually the 1st chapter out of about 5?? i don't know how to have it set to ch 1/5 so aha,, rippiee


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